Economy

The first leg of the 35-mile journey from Ghana’s capital city, Accra, to the Fairafric chocolate factory in Amanase on the N6 highway is a quick ride. But after about 30 minutes, the smoothly paved road devolves into a dirt expanse without lanes. Lumbering trucks, packed commuter minivans, cars and motorcycles crawl along craggy, rutted stretches bordered by concrete dividers, muddy patches and heaps of rock.The stopgap roadway infrastructure is one of the challenges Fairafric has had to navigate to build a factory in this West African country. The area had no fiber-optic connection to Ghana’s telecommunications network. No local banks were interested in lending the company money. And it required the personal intervention of Ghana’s president before construction could even begin in 2020.T...

On a recent July evening in Midtown Manhattan, a trio of teenage girls swooped into the feminine care aisle at Target. Skipping over the boxes of Always and Tampax tampons, they made a beeline to a shelf with sanitary pads from the Honey Pot Company. One asked her friend if she was going to pick out the pads with a “minty sensation.”The herbal pads, which are advertised as providing soothing comfort during menstruation, have been fodder for many videos on TikTok. In posts that have racked up thousands of likes, women wearing the pads bounce around with startled looks and compare the sensation to applying Icy Hot cream. (Some even have their boyfriends try it.) Others say they hate the feeling and the pads need to come with a warning. Regardless of whether consumers like the product, the Ho...

Federal Reserve officials received more good news in their battle against rapid inflation on Friday, when a key inflation measure continued to slow, the latest evidence that a return to normal after the pandemic and higher interest rates are combining to wrestle rapid price increases back to a more normal pace.The Personal Consumption Expenditures Index, which the central bank uses to define its 2 percent inflation goal, rose slightly more quickly last month as higher gas prices gave it a boost. It rose 3.5 percent in August from a year earlier, up from 3.4 percent in July.But after stripping out food and fuel costs, both of which are volatile, a “core” inflation measure that Fed officials watch closely is beginning to cool notably. That measure picked up 3.9 percent from a year earlier, w...

The day almost two years ago when Harvard Business School informed Francesca Gino, a prominent professor, that she was being investigated for data fraud also happened to be her husband’s 50th birthday. An administrator instructed her to turn in any Harvard-issued computer equipment that she had by 5 p.m. She canceled the birthday celebration she had planned and walked the machines to campus, where a University Police officer oversaw the transfer.“We ended up both going,” Dr. Gino recalled. “I couldn’t go on my own because I felt like, I don’t know, the earth was opening up under my feet for reasons that I couldn’t understand.”The school told Dr. Gino it had received allegations that she manipulated data in four papers on topics in behavioral science, which straddles fields like psychology,...

The Covid-19 pandemic hurt the U.S. economy in a lot of ways. It choked global supply chains, sent consumer prices soaring and briefly knocked millions of people out of work. But it might have also broken America out of a decades-long entrepreneurial slump.New research from economists at the University of Maryland and the Federal Reserve that was presented on Friday at the Brookings Institution, a think tank in Washington, documents a potentially durable surge in Americans starting businesses during and after the pandemic. The new companies range from restaurants and dry cleaners to high-tech start-ups.That surge appears to be a direct response to how the fallout of the virus quickly but permanently changed how many Americans live and work.Those changes opened doors for entrepreneurs, who,...

Follow our live updates for a potential government shutdown.The Biden administration offered new warnings on Wednesday that a government shutdown could disrupt the nation’s air travel system, part of an effort to lay blame at the feet of House Republicans ahead of a possible funding lapse this weekend.Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said that a shutdown would jeopardize the work the administration has done to address a shortage in air traffic controllers, modernize aviation technology and reduce flight delays and cancellations that have plagued travelers.“There is no good time for a government shutdown, but this is a particularly bad time for a government shutdown, especially when it comes to transportation,” Mr. Buttigieg said at a news conference at the Transportation Department’...

The United Automobile Workers union increased the pressure on Ford Motor and General Motors by extending its strike to two more car assembly plants on Friday, saying the companies had not moved far enough to meet its demands for higher pay and benefits.The move is the second escalation of strikes that started on Sept. 15 at three plants, one each owned by G.M., Ford and Stellantis, the parent of Chrysler, Jeep and Ram. The union said it would not expand the strike against Stellantis this week because of progress in negotiations there.The U.A.W.’s president, Shawn Fain, said workers at a Ford plant in Chicago and a G.M. factory in Lansing, Mich., would walk off the job on Friday. G.M. makes the Buick Enclave and Chevrolet Traverse sport-utility vehicles at the Lansing plant. Ford makes the ...

The unintended economic consequences of a shutdownWe’re less than 48 hours before the federal government shuts down, and Congress appears no closer to breaking an impasse over funding. Hard-right Republicans in the House are more focused on scoring political points, while their moderate (and electorally vulnerable) colleagues try to work with Democrats on a solution.As Washington and Wall Street gird themselves for an increasingly likely shutdown, it’s worth considering what might happen in that event.Government data: Statistics agencies, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Bureau of Economic Analysis, will suspend operations. Even a short shutdown will delay important releases, including the jobs report set for Oct. 6 and the Consumer Price Index set for Oct. 12.A brief delay...

Federal government shutdowns have become so common in recent years that forecasters have a good read on how another one would affect the American economy. The answer is fairly simple: The longer a shutdown lasts, the more damage it is likely to inflict.A brief shutdown would be unlikely to slow the economy significantly or push it into recession, economists on Wall Street and inside the Biden administration have concluded. That assessment is based in part on the evidence from prior episodes when Congress stopped funding many government operations.But a prolonged shutdown could hurt growth and potentially President Biden’s re-election prospects. It would join a series of other factors that are expected to weigh on the economy in the final months of this year, including high interest rates, ...

A federal agency on Thursday filed a lawsuit that accuses Tesla of discrimination against Black employees who it said were bombarded with racial epithets, given worse work assignments than white workers, and fired when they complained.Tesla managers were aware of the discrimination and verbal abuse, the lawsuit filed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission argues, but failed to do enough to stop it. The agency said it filed the lawsuit after trying unsuccessfully to work out a plan with Tesla to address the discrimination.The lawsuit is the latest to accuse Tesla of pervasive racism at its factory in Fremont, Calif., near San Francisco. This year, a jury awarded about $3.2 million to a Black man who had accused the carmaker of ignoring racial abuse he faced while working as a contra...